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Years of the Pygmies
The Years of the Pygmies was a period in the histories of the Confederation of North America and the United States of Mexico from 1902 to 1913. The period was marked by the appearance of colorless, risk-averse political leaders and steady economic growth in both countries. The term "Years of the Pygmies" was first coined by a reporter for the Boston Register on 1 March 1903 in response to the elections of Christopher Hemingway and Anthony Flores: "Gallivan and Hermión are both gone from the scene, and their like will not be seen again for many a year. We have left the Time of the Giants, and are about to enter the Years of the Pygmies." As Sobel notes, Hemingway introduced no new measures, started no crusades, and did not call the people of the C.N.A. to new reforms. All was going well, and Hemingway saw no need to rock the boat. Hemingway's predecessor, Clifton Burgen, and handpicked successor, Albert Merriman, were much the same, having no desire to innovate and a great love of crowds and travel. Merriman's first term was uneventful, and his re-election in 1913 was so certain that Sobel makes literally no mention of the 1913 Grand Council elections. President Flores of Mexico was much the same as Burgen, Hemingway, and Merriman. Each man was, in his own way, a moderate, an isolationist, and a person unwilling to innovate or take risks. When Flores said, "The people know me. I am one of them," columnist Diego Santiago of the Mexico City Times responded on 5 June 1909 that "The President is the lowest common denominator, and what is more surprising, he appears proud of it." Flores presided over an economic boom in the U.S.M. fueled by the production and export of petroleum, gold, cotton, and to a lesser extent, food, and by the import of machinery from the Germanic Confederation. At the same time, iron deposits in New Granada and Alaska, Alaskan coal, Mexico del Norte copper, and other raw materials were developed rapidly and profitably. The U.S.M.'s Gross National Product almost doubled in this period, the most rapid economic advance of any country in the world. Flores boasted that "ours is the most dynamic country in the history of mankind." (Population in millions, includes Guatemala, Hawaii, New Granada, and Alaska; excludes slaves. GNP, Exports, and Imports are in millions of Dolares. Petroleum production is in thousands of barrels. Source: U.S.M. Statistical Abstract, pp. 110, 540, 945, 1034, 1576.) However, the Mexican economy was not under the control of Flores, but of Diego Cortez y Catalán, and after 1904 Douglas Benedict, the Presidents of Kramer Associates, the largest corporation in the world. Out of Mexico's $20.4 billion G.N.P. in 1910, K.A. accounted for $10.9 billion. K.A. also owned the major new Mexican firms of the Years of the Pygmies, Jefferson Motors and the Carminales Lighting Company. Sob el describes the economic growth of the C.N.A. during the Years of the Pygmies as being less dramatic, but more substantial. In every year from 1900 to 1914, the country's G.N.P increased a minimum of six percent. The production of electricity rose from 65.7 million edisons in 1900 to 605.6 million in 1910. The number of locomobiles registered in the C.N.A rose from 18,000 to 769,000, while the cost of the lowest-priced model had fallen from N.A. £5,040 to N.A. £1,540. When Governor-General Clifton Burgen delivered a message over the radio in 1902, it was only heard in six cities. By the time of the 1908 Grand Council elections, the entire nation stayed up to listen to the election returns, in the first Nova Scotia-to-Manitoba hookup. By 1910, one of every fifteen urban housing units had indoor plumbing; every population center of more than 10,000 inhabitants was within fifteen miles of a railroad; and there were some 98,000 motion picture theatres with a weekly attendance of almost 50 million. Thomas Edison's invention of the airmobile shortly before his death in 1903 was followed within five years by the founding of Curtiss Aviation, Ltd., North American Airmobile, and Franklin Transportation, Ltd., all founded through loans from the National Financial Administration. The Years of the Pygmies came to an end in 1914 in the U.S.M., with the election of Victoriano Consalus and the coming of the Hundred Day War and the Chapultepec Treason Trials. In the C.N.A., the era ended in 1916 when the Chapultepec Incident brought the country to the brink of war with the U.S.M., and ushered in the Malaise Years. ---- Sobel's sources for the Years of the Pygmies are Hemingway's The Way of the World (New York, 1911); Gallivan's At the End of the Day (New York, 1912); Arnold Marriot's Years of the Pygmies (New York, 1923); James Harper's The Mexican Miracle: The Economy Under Flores and Parsons (Mexico City, 1955); Carlos Snyder's The Eagle's Wings (New York, 1955); Isaac Stephenson's Dreams for a Shilling: The Early History of the Motion Picture (New York, 1955); John Flaherty's The Sound and the Fury: Radio in the C.N.A. (London, 1965) and The Carminales Legacy: Mexico's Edison (London, 1971); Dame Maria Carlyle's Everyday Life in North America in the Early Twentieth Century (London, 1967); Leland French's In the Shadow of the Giants: The Burgen-Hemingway-Merriman Years (New York, 1969); Wyatt Turner's The Story of the North American Locomobile (New York, 1969); Stanley Tulin's The Kramer Associates: The Cortez Years (London, 1970); and Hubert Lodge's Men for Their Age: The Hemingway and Merriman Administrations (New York, 1971). ---- This was the Featured Article for the week of 2 February 2014. Category:Historical eras Category:Featured Articles